Back strengthener 6: floating arms

warning exclamation markSafety first!
Read safety
basics here

Note: there are sev­eral ver­sions of the back strengthen­ers, lis­ted below in order of dif­fi­culty

What it’s good for
  • You can sit, stand and walk upright with good pos­ture for longer without get­ting back ache or neck pain
  • Reduced back and neck pain if you have arth­ritis or sim­ilar spinal prob­lems
  • You stay taller and look straighter and less aged
  • Helps to pre­vent shoulder hunch­ing and the gradual round­ing of the top of the back
How often to do it Daily
Equipment you’ll need A mat, rug, car­pet, towel or any­thing else you can lie on com­fort­ably on the floor

Lying face down with arms in I surrender position at start of back raise

Lying face down with arms in I surrender, floating off the ground at top of back raise

  • Lie face down, elbows bent and palms flat, roughly by your ears (if you were stand­ing, you’d have your arms in a pos­i­tion that said “I sur­render”)
  • Rest your fore­head on a small cush­ion to stop your head hanging, and any neck strain
  • Draw in lower abs gently, lift your chest away from the ground and at the same time float your arms up with you, length­en­ing your head
  • for­wards as you hover
  • Keep look­ing down, so you don’t pull your neck back
  • Don’t lift too high: if you feel your lower back scrunch­ing, you have gone a bit far, so relax a frac­tion
  • Hold the back raise for 5, breath­ing, then lower care­fully
  • Rest briefly then repeat

Aim for 10 raises at one go.

Cannot do this at all? If you are find­ing this impossible, try Back Strengthener 1: Supported super­man instead

Varying the exer­cise for more chal­lenge

In this pos­i­tion, your arms are adding quite a lot of extra load to work the back muscles even harder. Work up to 3 sets of 10 daily. You will be doing great work in main­tain­ing strength through your spine, which should repay you in your every­day life.

Increase Text Size Increase Text Size

In: Body Maintenance Manual Tags: ,

Comments are closed.